The ambulance crew had at first taken the 55-year-old victim when he was still alive but after he died just after receiving treatment the paramedics drove back to the crash site and left the remains in a body bag.

"We were surprised, disgusted and shocked," one fireman, who was on the scene at the crash site in southern Poland, told the Polish newspaper Polska. "It came as a surprise when the ambulance crew drove up, unloaded a body, left it by the road and then drove off." But Marek Jeremicz, spokesman for the local ambulance service, defended the paramedics' decision to leave the body, citing a lack of regulations and the importance of keeping ambulances operational.

"They didn't break any rules because there aren't any rules concerning this," he told the TVN 24 news network. "You play it by ear. And what happens if the ambulance gets tied up in regulations while transporting a body? An ambulance should be first and foremost for the living.

"So the corpse was put in a body bag and placed in the care of the police."

Pawel Lotocki, spokesman for the local police, said it was the first time he had "encountered this kind of situation."